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North Carolina families head north to avoid Hurricane Florence

Register-Herald (Beckley, WV)

Sept. 14--The parking lot at the Tamarack travel plaza was crowded with vehicles bearing North Carolina tags Thursday morning, as those seeking shelter from Hurricane Florence stopped in Beckley to fuel up and rest.

Ed Kaufman and Jennifer Aekyung stopped with their kids, 9-year-old Emelyn and 13-year-old Christopher, en route to Kaufman's mother's house in Ohio.

The family lives on base at the air station at Marine Corps Base Camp LeJeune in North Carolina. On Tuesday, they said commanding officers gave them a mandatory evacuation notice.

"We just wanted to get the kids out of Dodge," Aekyung said. "We packed as best we could, so no debris was floating around, tied everything down, taped up the windows.

"It's really sad, because we live on base, but people had already started to loot some of the houses," she added. "We have a video camera, but it doesn't do us any good when the power goes out on base.

"We're just holding our breath, hoping it goes gently on us. Once it touches ground, we can call the insurance company... so they can take it from there."

The couple rescued a dog that their neighbor had abandoned in a storage unit, without food or water, they reported.

"I was putting stuff in to storage when I was hearing howls and barking," Aekyung said.

Kaufman said he told an officer about the dog trapped next door.

"He said it's a judgment call, people versus animals, and we have to do people first, unfortunately," Kaufman said.

Later, the same officer gave Kaufman permission to crawl into the space and rescue the dog -- a Bassett hound mix, he reported.

"The shelters were very busy," Kaufman said. "A neighbor who was staying to weather the storm took the dog in.

"That was a good dog."

Emilyn said she wasn't expecting the storm to be very bad but looked forward to playing with her cousins in Ohio. Christopher wanted to stay in North Carolina.

"I honestly thought it would be fun to go outside and boogie board down the streets," Christopher explained.

Instead, Aekyung packed winter clothes for Ohio, and the family loaded Toto, the family dog, and headed North.

Kaufman reported there were many accidents along Interstate 40, as people evacuated, and traffic was at a crawl. A 12-hour trip turned into a two-day trip.

John Viton of Newport, N.C., near Emerald Isle, was also on his way to Ohio, along with his wife, Kathy, and Kathy's 91-year-old mother, Norma Bachman.

"We had just boarded up our house two days ago," Viton said. "We were going to ride it out, and the predictions were so bad yesterday morning, we got on the phone and drove to Roanoke (Va.) to get out of the way.